19 replies to this topic

[gstanton]

I've been slowly working on a newer version of the ProSystem emulator so I thought I would start a new thread detailing the progress and to get feedback. Just from looking around the forums I've noted that the timing in the emulator (Maria) does not match the documents and causes a lot of graphic glitches. This is one things that I'm addressing in the newer version. Here is a list of the known things that should be fixed that I know of:

1. Maria cycle timing / DMA cycle stealing
2. 2 Button Joystick support
3. Riot Timer
4. Accurate INPTCTRL port emulation (MEN, Bios/Cartridge switch, lock, etc)
5. Rendering pixels during and after DMA stops
6. Lightgun support
7. Slowdown for TIA/RIOT memory accesses
8. RIOT I/O port read/write masking

I plan to take into account changes that have been added since 1.0 (ie 1.1, 1.2, and 1.3) and put them into version 2. Version 2 is being written from scratch. I've finished the 6502 emulation already. The CPU is emulated at the cycle level (not instruction level) and should perform the correct read/write access to memory per cycle. This will help to emulate the TIA/RIOT slowdown emulation. I've also re-done how the memory is mapped. It will emulate the MEN (Maria ENable) memory mapping better and allow for 7800 or 2600 modes. I'm now working on the MARIA emulation. I've created a GUI debugger in order to track down some of these problems and hope to release that as well. My goal is to make this emulator as accurate as possible. My second goal is to provide a tool so that we can create some more games for the system (Moon Patrol anyone?). I would like this thread to start fleshing out some of the details of what is wrong with the current emulation and to collect in one place. Feedback is appreciated.

[GroovyBee]

Check out the latest version of the Wii ProSytem emulator for fixes that have already been applied to your list.

See this thread for emulator problems :-

http://www.atariage.com/forums/index.php?s...t&p=1767428

There are other MARIA "features" e.g. visual glitches when its being pushed to the limit on real hardware. I need to document them too.

The PAL palette also needs fixing because its way off.

[PacManPlus]

Please Please Please have High Score Cart support!

[Trebor]

Overall problems/issues/request features:
-Fullscreen VSync and Triple Buffering needed. Especially noticeable with Kung-Fu Master, Scrapyard Dog, and Jr. Pac-Man scrolling.

-Remapping of all inputs/functions (For instance, Reset/Select/Pause buttons and A/B switch).

-Ability to map more than one device/key input corresponding to an Atari 7800 input (I.E. Up on Player One Controller = Up Arrow, or/and Joystick 0 Up, or/and 'W' key or/and Num Pad '8').

-A/B difficulty switch does not function properly - Right now it needs to be held down instead of a true toggle switch.

-If you launch a ROM from the command line the sound is a second or two behind the action, regardless of the sound latency setting. This is fixed by hitting 'Tab' bringing up the menu bar (And then hit 'Tab' again to get rid of it). However, it would be nice for the sound to be in sync when launching from a command line without the need of bringing up the file bar menu.

-Sound "glitches" which appear in some games can be cleared by setting the sample rate to 96000. Unfortunately, every time you exit and relaunch Prosystem it returns back to its default setting of 44100 [Fixed in one of the 1.3x releases].

-Aspect Ratio correction. Retaining a 4:3 display despite using a 16:9 or 16:10 monitor.

-"True" NTSC video emulation. Stella has recently implemented a 'hackish' way of doing this display. Which isn't bad, but the cycle based accurate NES emulator, Nestopia and the cycle based accurate SNES emulator, bsnes among others, such as the Atari 5200 emulator kat5200 has integrated this: http://www.fly.net/~ant/libs/ntsc.html



Game Specific features/issues:
-64kb games [Realsports Baseball, Tank Command, Tower Toppler, Water Ski] do not work, but if overdumped to 128kb then they work.

-Beef Drop - Sound Issue. Occasional high-pitch squeal throughout the playing of background melody (TIA mode). Does not appear to play Pokey Sound at all. [I Believe this is fixed in one of the 1.3x updates].

-Commando - Display Issue. Glitches along the bottom of the title screen.

-Food Fight - Upper left hand corner displays one or two scanlines of "Player's" face during gameplay.

-Karateka - Timing Issues - The "story" scroll is too fast.

-Kung-Fu Master - Display Issue(s). Screen is off-center and there appears two lines in the upper left corner. Score and timer bottom of digits off-color. Additionally, the initial BIOS/load Atari Screen does not scroll colors thru the Fuji correctly.

-Missing In Action - Various display/graphic issues.

-One On One Basketball - Timing Issues (Related to Karateka perhaps) - Countdown clock is way too fast.

Looking foward to the 2.0 release, Greg! Thanks for this thread and keep up the great work!

-Trebor

Edited by Trebor, Sun Jun 28, 2009 4:46 AM.

[gdement]

gstanton, on Sat Jun 27, 2009 9:52 AM, said:

2. 2 Button Joystick support

If you haven't seen it already, please check the RIOT code in ProSystem 1.3e regarding the controllers. I believe the same changes were also put in the latest version of the Wii emulator, and that might also have a fix for a HSC issue so that's still probably the best place to look.

1.3e emulates the behavior of CTLSWA/SWCHA and CTLSWB/SWCHB much better than previous versions, so the controllers (even the console switches) are improved in that version. I did some experimenting with the console and there's some esoteric behavior involved that might not be obvious.

Edited by gdement, Wed Jul 1, 2009 5:41 AM.

[ttom]

My Prosystem emulator on Windows XP has started having sound problems. Some sounds are distorted and other sounds are missing. My computer and my other emulators sound work fine, so I redownloaded Prosystem again with no luck. I tried older Prosystems too and the same missing sound issues occur. I tried adjusting the sound settings in Prosystem and that didn't solve the problem, so I'm not sure where to go from here. Could anyone please help me out on this problem?

[Gregory DG]

Can't wait for version 2.0! I look forward to the new features!

[ttom]

ttom, on Sat Sep 12, 2009 7:43 PM, said:

My Prosystem emulator on Windows XP has started having sound problems. Some sounds are distorted and other sounds are missing. My computer and my other emulators sound work fine, so I redownloaded Prosystem again with no luck. I tried older Prosystems too and the same missing sound issues occur. I tried adjusting the sound settings in Prosystem and that didn't solve the problem, so I'm not sure where to go from here. Could anyone please help me out on this problem?

Has anyone ever had this type of sound problem with prosystem?
I'm not sure if this is just an isolated flaw when using on my computer.

[GroovyBee]

So this is a recent change in ProSystem's behaviour? Does that mean it worked OK at some point in the past on that PC? Have you moved the ProSystem files around? Have you deleted ProSystem.ini and tried the emulator again? Can you attach ProSystem.log after you've run a *.a78 game?

[gdement]

ttom, on Sun Sep 13, 2009 1:54 PM, said:

ttom, on Sat Sep 12, 2009 7:43 PM, said:

My Prosystem emulator on Windows XP has started having sound problems. Some sounds are distorted and other sounds are missing. My computer and my other emulators sound work fine, so I redownloaded Prosystem again with no luck. I tried older Prosystems too and the same missing sound issues occur. I tried adjusting the sound settings in Prosystem and that didn't solve the problem, so I'm not sure where to go from here. Could anyone please help me out on this problem?

Has anyone ever had this type of sound problem with prosystem?
I'm not sure if this is just an isolated flaw when using on my computer.

It's not just you. But it's odd if yours was working then went bad later...

I've always had sound problems, and some other people have also reported it. My brother in law has a much newer/faster computer than mine and it doesn't have this problem.
This made me suspicious that the problem has something to do with CPU usage. The emulator eats 100% of CPU time constantly, which in itself is really a bug. I wonder if fixing that would end up also fixing the sound problem.
I wonder if people still have this problem with fast single CPUs, or if it's only fixed by having dual cores. Or maybe speed has nothing to do with it.
I have an old dual P2 machine that might be an interesting test case, but it's running Linux.

[ttom]

GroovyBee, on Sun Sep 13, 2009 3:58 PM, said:

So this is a recent change in ProSystem's behaviour? Does that mean it worked OK at some point in the past on that PC? Have you moved the ProSystem files around? Have you deleted ProSystem.ini and tried the emulator again? Can you attach ProSystem.log after you've run a *.a78 game?

It did work fine before and I redownloaded it a few times. My Stella, Sega Fusion and Mame emulator's sound work. I checked the log and the two errors are:
"Direct sound has not been initialized" and "Direct input has not been initialized"

I did add Mame recently, so this may have slowed my computer down a bit for Prosystem.

[gdement]

ttom, on Mon Sep 14, 2009 2:12 AM, said:

I did add Mame recently, so this may have slowed my computer down a bit for Prosystem.

Unless Mame is actually running at the same time, then having it installed shouldn't make any difference.

Sounds like it's probably a result of the DirectSound issue. If it was working before, then something must have broken DirectSound somehow.

Edited by gdement, Mon Sep 14, 2009 6:22 PM.

[ttom]

gdement, on Mon Sep 14, 2009 6:21 PM, said:

ttom, on Mon Sep 14, 2009 2:12 AM, said:

I did add Mame recently, so this may have slowed my computer down a bit for Prosystem.

Unless Mame is actually running at the same time, then having it installed shouldn't make any difference.

Sounds like it's probably a result of the DirectSound issue. If it was working before, then something must have broken DirectSound somehow.

[ttom]

gdement, on Mon Sep 14, 2009 6:21 PM, said:

ttom, on Mon Sep 14, 2009 2:12 AM, said:

I did add Mame recently, so this may have slowed my computer down a bit for Prosystem.

Unless Mame is actually running at the same time, then having it installed shouldn't make any difference.

Sounds like it's probably a result of the DirectSound issue. If it was working before, then something must have broken DirectSound somehow.

Thanks. I will check the Prosystem Emulator sites. If there are any trouble shooting methods to fix this error message, I will mention it in this blog just in case this problem pops up with anyone else.

[ttom]

ttom, on Sat Sep 12, 2009 7:43 PM, said:

My Prosystem emulator on Windows XP has started having sound problems. Some sounds are distorted and other sounds are missing. My computer and my other emulators sound work fine, so I redownloaded Prosystem again with no luck. I tried older Prosystems too and the same missing sound issues occur. I tried adjusting the sound settings in Prosystem and that didn't solve the problem, so I'm not sure where to go from here. Could anyone please help me out on this problem?

All is well with the great Prosystem Emulator!

After many trials and "ERRORS" on my computer, I downloaded Prosystem onto my wife's computer and the sound is perfect.
I'm not sure how to fix my computer. The sounds still works on everthing else, including my other emulators.

[SoundGammon]

...my feedback is probably trivial, but if the palette can be adjusted per game if possible would be nice. I play Asteroids a lot on the expert setting and the asteroids that are suppose to be blue are an off-green. Just bugs me...

[Trebor]

SoundGammon, on Thu Sep 24, 2009 1:17 PM, said:

...my feedback is probably trivial, but if the palette can be adjusted per game if possible would be nice. I play Asteroids a lot on the expert setting and the asteroids that are suppose to be blue are an off-green. Just bugs me...

On my TV set, the color is more of an off-green than a blue

That is one of the problems with traditional NTSC televisions. You can have different hues/tints depending on the set as well as factory and user adjustments. The best solution is what I mentioned earlier in this thread...

"-"True" NTSC video emulation. Stella has recently implemented a 'hackish' way of doing this display. Which isn't bad, but the cycle based accurate NES emulator, Nestopia and the cycle based accurate SNES emulator, bsnes among others, such as the Atari 5200 emulator kat5200 has integrated this: http://www.fly.net/~ant/libs/ntsc.html"

Such an implementation can include adjustments for brightness, contrast, color/saturation, and tint/hue. It also features detailed picture tuning associated with resolution, artifacts, fringing and color bleeding.

Furthermore, it appears Stella will be implementing the aforementioned NTSC video emulation and we may even see it by version 3.1

See here, point # 1 by Stephen 'blargg filter':
http://www.atariage....ost__p__1836438

-Trebor

Edited by Trebor, Thu Sep 24, 2009 6:41 PM.

[gdement]

ttom, on Thu Sep 24, 2009 9:58 AM, said:

All is well with the great Prosystem Emulator!

After many trials and "ERRORS" on my computer, I downloaded Prosystem onto my wife's computer and the sound is perfect.
I'm not sure how to fix my computer. The sounds still works on everthing else, including my other emulators.

Just to have some data points on the record, do you know what type of processor and sound card are in each of those machines?

[ttom]

gdement, on Thu Sep 24, 2009 8:38 PM, said:

ttom, on Thu Sep 24, 2009 9:58 AM, said:

All is well with the great Prosystem Emulator!

After many trials and "ERRORS" on my computer, I downloaded Prosystem onto my wife's computer and the sound is perfect.
I'm not sure how to fix my computer. The sounds still works on everthing else, including my other emulators.

Just to have some data points on the record, do you know what type of processor and sound card are in each of those machines?

Sorry it took so long to get back. As far as what type both computers have, I'm not sure off hand. Maybe this is something I can check out in the control panels. If I see any differences, I will let you know.

[SoundGammon]

Trebor, on Thu Sep 24, 2009 6:35 PM, said:

SoundGammon, on Thu Sep 24, 2009 1:17 PM, said:

...my feedback is probably trivial, but if the palette can be adjusted per game if possible would be nice. I play Asteroids a lot on the expert setting and the asteroids that are suppose to be blue are an off-green. Just bugs me...

On my TV set, the color is more of an off-green than a blue

That is one of the problems with traditional NTSC televisions. You can have different hues/tints depending on the set as well as factory and user adjustments. The best solution is what I mentioned earlier in this thread...

"-"True" NTSC video emulation. Stella has recently implemented a 'hackish' way of doing this display. Which isn't bad, but the cycle based accurate NES emulator, Nestopia and the cycle based accurate SNES emulator, bsnes among others, such as the Atari 5200 emulator kat5200 has integrated this: http://www.fly.net/~ant/libs/ntsc.html"

Such an implementation can include adjustments for brightness, contrast, color/saturation, and tint/hue. It also features detailed picture tuning associated with resolution, artifacts, fringing and color bleeding.

Furthermore, it appears Stella will be implementing the aforementioned NTSC video emulation and we may even see it by version 3.1

See here, point # 1 by Stephen 'blargg filter':
http://www.atariage....ost__p__1836438

-Trebor

I adjusted the delay in my 7800 and got the blue to show up!